Original Ottoman Turkish Text

Metre: fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilātün fe‘ilün

Bendedür şehd-i mükerrer lebüñe ḳand ü nebāt
La‘l-i cān-baḫşuña teşne nitekim āb-ı ḥayāt
Vaḳthā girye vü zār ile görüp bendesini
Eglenürdi sehel ol virmese ger ‘ömre s̱ebāt
Ben gedā ḳanda vü yā la‘l-i dürer-bārı anuñ
Bes durur ‘arż-ı cemāl olsa faḳīrine ẕekāt
Gösterüp ruḫlarını lu‘b ile ol şāh-ı cemāl
Ḳıldı manṣūbe-i zülf ile bugün şehleri māt
Ser-i zülfinde giriftār olalum şöyle Münīr
Çün kim āzādelıġ oldur dir imiş ehl-i necāt

In English

1. Sugar and candy are slaves to your lips, sweet as honey refined again and again; even so the water of life thirsts for your life-giving ruby lips.

2. Seeing his servant now and then weeping and lamenting, he would amuse himself (mock him, or linger a little by him); had he not given life constancy, this would be easy (to bear).

3. Where am I, a beggar, and where his pearl-scattering ruby lips; it is enough as alms for his poor one that he shows the beauty of his face.

4. That king of beauty, showing his cheeks (the rooks of chess) in play, today checkmated kings with the gambit of his tresses.

5. O Münîr, let us be captive thus at the tip of his tresses; for those who have attained salvation are said to say that this is true freedom.

Literary and Historical Commentary

Structure of the Poem

The poem is a five-couplet Turkish ghazal (gazel) and is the twenty-second of the Turkish ghazals in the edition (tg 22). The metre is "fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilâtün fe‘ilün". The ghazal has no refrain (redif); the rhyme is the sound "-āt": nebāt, ḥayāt, s̱ebāt, ẕekāt, māt, necāt. The poem is found in the Vatican (VT 103b), Vienna (VY 84a) and Istanbul University (Ü 21a) manuscripts; the apparatus shows no variant readings. To whom and when it was written is not known.

Meaning and Figures of Speech

The main theme of the ghazal is the sweetness of the beloved's lips and the sovereignty of his beauty. In the opening couplet (matla) sugar, candy and honey are counted as the slaves of the lips; the water of life too thirsts for the life-giving lips. "Şehd-i mükerrer" in its dictionary sense means honey refined again and again, pure honey. The word "bende" (slave, servant) begins the relation of master and servant that will continue in the later couplets of the ghazal.

The second couplet is not entirely clear. The verb "eglenmek" in Old Turkish, in its dictionary sense, means both "to stop, to linger" and "to mock, to amuse oneself". In the first reading the beloved, on seeing his weeping servant, would mock him; had life not dragged on with this pain, that is, had life not been given constancy, this would have been an easy thing for the lover. In the second reading the beloved would linger a little beside his weeping servant. The word "sehel" (easy, slight) in the second half of the line may also be understood differently according to these two readings. These explanations are our own inference.

In the third couplet the pattern "ben gedā ḳanda vü yā" (where am I, a beggar, and where…) is a known turn of phrase expressing the great difference between two things. The distance between the beggar lover and the pearl-scattering lips is shown with this pattern. The lover counts the showing of the beauty of the face as alms given to him. The alms of beauty is a thought often met with in divan poetry: the beautiful one ought to give a share of his beauty to the poor lover.

The fourth couplet is a chess couplet. The word "ruḫ" in its dictionary sense means both cheek and the rook in chess; the words "şāh" (king), "māt" (checkmate), "lu‘b" (play) and "manṣūbe" (gambit, move) also come from the language of chess. The beloved has checkmated the kings of the world by showing his cheeks and setting a trap with his tresses. This congruence of images (tenasüp) built from chess terms and the double entendre (tevriye) on "ruḫ" are the real subtlety of the couplet.

In the pen-name couplet a contrast is set up between captivity and freedom. To be captive to the tresses is the true freedom of which those who have attained salvation speak. The word "necāt" (salvation) widens the relation of master and servant that has run since the opening couplet toward a Sufi meaning.

Bibliography

Online sources